Switch eShop Game Reviews
A real Class act
Everything was leading up to this. Danganronpa. Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair. The anime Danganronpa 3: The End of Hope’s Peak High School. Even the god-awful, mercifully not re-released for Switch Ultra Despair Girls. It has all lead to Danganron
Nagito you will never know, anything about my home
It’s Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair, and this time it’s on a tropical island. Now, being a sort of anime-ish game, you’d think that means the variously endowed female cast taking their turns to show up in swimsuits in a somewhat desperate parade of fanservice, and you’d be right! Danganronpa...
Havoc go if you think you're hard enough
The Danganronpa franchise is a twisted, vulgar little thing. Rife with problematic politics, egregious erotic fanservice and some truly breathtakingly ill-judged swings at far heavier themes than it really has any right to tackle, it is in many ways a reprehensible, amoral and quite appalling series of games...
Mini Review Real Boxing 2 (Switch) - A Pitifully Poor Punch-Out That Should Have Stayed On Phones
Fright Night
Boxing games live or die by their gameplay. You can make the visuals look as beautiful as possible, down to the rippling biceps and beads of sweat, but if the punches don’t land right, then the whole experience will suffer as a result. Unfortunately, Real Boxing 2 comes up short with both its visuals and its gameplay, delivering a...
Review Ruined King: A League of Legends Story (Switch) - A Brilliant Experience Beyond Its Franchise
Comfortably out of League's league
It feels like the world of Runeterra has just entered the first stages of a great expansion. After being mostly confined to the MOBA for years, things like the new Arcane show, an impending MMO, and some spinoff games are starting to bring this rich universe to audiences that aren’t reached by the main title...
Review Death's Door (Switch) - Much More Than The Sum Of Its Zelda And Soulslike Parts
Ready to play the reaper's game?
Despite all the innovation that frequently takes place in the indie space, there’s an awful lot of games that are content to just do what’s already been done. It can be easy to become jaded, then, when a lot of these copycat games turn out to be worse than their clear inspiration. After all, who wants to waste...
Review Unsighted (Switch) - A Fantastic Top-Down Metroidvania With A Warm, Vintage Feel
The final countdown
Sometimes a great idea needs time to mature. Just because a smart concept isn’t executed all that well, it doesn’t mean there isn’t an excellent game coming a sequel or two down the line. What’s incredible about Unsighted is that first-time indie dev Studio Pixel Punk has created the refined experience of a longstanding...
Mini Review Klang 2 (Switch) - A Noisy But Satisfying Rhythm Adventure
Pitch please
There isn’t exactly an abundance of rhythm games available on the Switch (certainly not recently), so it goes without saying that Klang 2 sticks out a bit from the pack simply by catering to this oft-overlooked genre. We’re not sure why Tinimations decided to bring Klang 2 over to the Switch before its predecessor, but from what...
Review Epic Chef (Switch) - Needlessly Bloated But Perfectly Edible
Undercooked life sim
Despite what its name suggests, Epic Chef is about more than just cooking. Taking place in the city of Ambrosia, you take on the role of Zest (like lemon zest, right? Ha!), who is chucked head-first out of a ship as it comes to a stop at the city docks. After meeting a few of the local residents, he makes his way to a run-down...
A chaser
The weight of expectation can be a terrible thing for a game. When you expect nothing, every moment has the potential to offer a surprise and an unanticipated feeling of discovery, and the original Toree 3D benefited from absolute zero expectations when it launched back in April. Releasing out of nowhere for a bargain basement price,...
Review Beyond Blue (Switch) - Echoes Of Endless Ocean In This Noble Effort That Never Quite Gels
More wet than deep
Imagine you dragged yourself into a boring marine biology lecture and it turned out to be an awesome rock concert about dolphins. That’s the edutainment promise and it’s more or less what E-Line Media seem to be aiming for with Beyond Blue – but with a cool video game instead of the rock concert. There’s some serious cred...
Review A Boy And His Blob (Switch) - An Experience That Has Aged Gracefully
A solid re-released remake
For anyone not in the know, A Boy and His Blob has a surprisingly deep history, going all the way back to 1989. Originally released on the NES under the title A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia, it was since re-imagined for the Wii by developer WayForward, dropping the subtitle in the process. As far as reboots go...
Review Airborne Kingdom (Switch) - A City Builder Looking For The Right Balance
A city, lighter than air
If you’re someone who’s roamed the streets of Bioshock Infinite’s floating city of Columbia and found yourself wondering exactly how a city like that might actually be feasible, you’re in the right place. Airborne Kingdom is a city builder that takes to the skies, tasking you with creating your very own floating...
Review Animal Crossing: New Horizons - Happy Home Paradise DLC (Switch) - A Slice Of Designer Heaven
The 3DS spin-off concept finds its true home
Back when Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer was released on 3DS it was considered by some to be a slightly strange beast. It was enjoyable and charming enough, but its main issue was that it was a tough sell as a standalone retail game. Once you took the plunge it was a lovely time, but the...
Now that's a name I've not heard in a long time
The Star Wars universe has always been far richer and more interesting than just the small slice shown off in the massively popular films, although most of this expanded lore has since been ‘decanonized’ shortly after Disney acquired the IP. One of the most notable parts of this legacy content was...
Review Unpacking (Switch) - An Emotive Experience, Beautifully Packaged On Switch
Living in a box
Videogames: pure escapism. Enact extreme, often immoral, experiences that you would never dare explore in real life: steal a car, murder hundreds of people, grow a moustache and stamp turtles to death. But Unpacking ups the ante: how would it feel to keep your cutlery in the second drawer down? Yes, a journey into the mind of a...
Mini Review Gynoug (Switch) - Switch Takes Another Fine Shmup Under Its Wing
Flappy bird[man]
It’s obvious from the moment you start Gynoug that this is another release from the same team that recently re-gifted the world Gleylancer, presenting players as it does with the same options using the same interface, just with a different Mega Drive shmup running underneath it all. This is great. As we mentioned in our other...
Mini Review Tunche (Switch) - A Quality Beat 'Em Up That'll Make You Fight Through Its Flaws
Ninja (side) scroll
Are you looking for a fight, mate? Are you looking for a fight? Sounds like the threatening enquiry of a ne'er-do-well, but it’s the height of decorum compared to the typical inhabitant of a scrolling beat 'em up. Tunche is no different, as its assorted jungle pests don’t stop to ask how you feel about being licked, whomped,...
Review Voice Of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars (Switch) - Yoko Taro Deals An Impressive Card-Based RPG
A royal flush
Especially in more recent years, the eccentric Yoko Taro of Nier fame has made quite a name for himself as a game designer simply without an equal. Any project he works on is sure to be interesting and experimental in certain ways, and this trend has continued with his latest release: Voice of Cards: The Isle Dragon Roars. Though this...
Mini Review TOEM (Switch) - A Relaxing, Snap-Happy Delight
Capture the moment
Toem is a charming photography game that’s full of great moments, a lot of heart, and clever puzzles. You’ll travel around the black and white world, encountering interesting characters, all set in diorama-style levels that are begging you to explore them. By solving their problems with your trusty camera, you’ll earn stamps...
Mini Review Circa Infinity (Switch) - Concentrated Concentricity Is Confoundingly Circular
Be there or be square
For centuries, the circle has left indelible marks on our culture: Wagner’s Ring cycle; Dante’s Inferno; Pythagoras’ Theorem; Domino’s Pizza. And now Kenny Sun’s Circa Infinity arrives on Switch to distract us from all of them – except maybe the pizza. Fresh on console, this puzzle/action indie platformer hit PC in...
Review Dusk (Switch) - An Incredible Port Of 2018's Quake-Inspired Boomer Shooter
Dusk and ye shall receive
Thank whichever deity (or prominent YouTuber, we guess) that you believe in for the "Boomer Shooter" explosion, and we mean explosion. Now that those who grew up on the original Quake (currently available in a very good edition on Switch) are themselves developers, we're seeing a bigtime resurgence of old-school style...
Gross Negligee
A terrible way to play a very good game. That pretty much sums up our thoughts on this cloud version of Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy on Switch. Where we've previously rated cloud versions of the likes of Hitman 3 and The Forgotten City as worth your time and money — with the caveat that streaming has its inherent foibles —...
Review Fatal Frame: Maiden Of Black Water (Switch) - A Ghostly Wii U Treat Resurfaces On Switch
Maiden voyeurage
Were you to see a ghost cutting about, what would be your first instinct? Forgive us for this assumption, but we imagine it's probably not "take a polaroid of it", right? Tell that to the various heroes of Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water — Project Zero in Europe — who seem to fancy themselves budding Sir Donald McCullins and...
Review The Legend Of Tianding (Switch) - Terrific Combat In An Intriguing Setting
Tanto-lising combat
It’s always a joy to see an under-represented culture or time period in video games. In The Legend of Tianding, you’re thrown into the streets of Taipei - the capital of Taiwan - during the early 20th century as the legendary outlaw, Liao Tianding. It’s a wonderfully authentic take with locations that feel remarkably alive...
Exactly what it says on the tin
We all worship the deluxe son et lumière of today’s games. Battles suck us in with explosive imagery, lavish cutscenes frame every encounter and voice artists declaim stories to rend our hearts. Wouldn’t it be embarrassing, then, if that were all shown to be a charade? If a game came along that created more...
Mini Review Evertried (Switch) - An Engaging Roguelite, Half Tactics, Half Puzzler
Try, try again
Some games just cut right to the chase. No set up, no indulgent intro, just a fast cutscene and you’re tossed in the deep end. Evertried is one of those games. Here you’re placed in the role of a cute little undead creature with a scythe who has to climb “The Tower”. See, in this world, lost souls that haven’t proven...
Mini Review A Little Golf Journey (Switch) - A Relaxing If Repetitive Round
Just over par
Golf games tend to come in a variety of flavours. You’ve got the realistic sim games such as PGA Tour 2K21, the more arcade focused romps like Mario Golf: Super Rush, and abstract, minimal titles like Golf Club: Wasteland.
Review Crysis 3 Remastered (Switch) - The Best-Looking But Shortest Game In The Trilogy
Game, Ceph and Match
The final instalment in Crytek's Crysis franchise is the best-looking of the bunch by quite some distance, a big budget action extravaganza that looks and sounds incredible as you blaze through its five hour long campaign. But can the Switch handle it? Well, we're happy to report that yes, it can. Saber Interactive has delivered...
Review Crysis 2 Remastered (Switch) - A Solid Port Of A Spectacular Shooter
The Manhattan Project
After surprising us in the best possible way with a thoroughly impressive Switch port of 2007's original Crysis, Saber Interactive return with this remastered version of Crytek's second Nano-suited super soldier adventure. But can the Switch handle the stress of this big budget sequel? Well, yes it can. In fact this is a...